Hear the wind blow, love!

The first wind that I ever heard was as a child living in Oklahoma. The wind would blow all the time it seemed like. But then I never noticed the wind much --that it was blowing but it never was a bother. It was just there -- part of the landscape and part of my childhood.

After I married my sweetheart and we moved to Chicago then Ithaca, New York then Albuquerque, New Mexico where he was employed after receiving his PhD from Cornell. One night as we were lying in bed preparing to go to sleep I asked him, "can you hear that? he said "hear what?". "The silence. I can't hear the wind blowing. It's so quiet!"

We have lived in 9 states. Oklahoma was our birthplace then we married and moved to Evanston, Illinois. Of course, Oklahoma is known for tornadoes and High winds. And oh how the wind blew in Chicago off Lake Michigan all the way up to Evanston where we left and Bob attended Northwestern University and I worked for Rotary international.

From Illinois, we moved to Ithaca, New York and Cornell University where Bob received his PhD and the wind blew and the snows fell and it was quite an experience. While we were there I worked for Cornell University in the ILR school which was Industrial and Labor Relations as a secretary for Dr . Risley
The Asst Dean. I got to met Dean Rusk, Sec of State and Bobby Kennedy, brother of JFK & Presidential nominee.

Our two sons were born in Ithaca and were 1 1/2 and 2 weeks old when we moved to Albuquerque, New Mexico where Bob worked for Sandia Labs and we watched the Wind blow the tumbleweeds across the desert. We bought our first home there which cost us $14,700 in 1969 on Tahiti Street.
But the wind was different in the desert in Albuquerque. It didn't blow all the time like it did in Oklahoma and it was here in our first home that I heard the silence without the wind.

From Albuquerque we moved to Palo Alto, California. It was here I got to experience the wind off the San Francisco Bay. It smelled so different from anything I had ever experienced because I had never lived near an ocean before. I could smell the salty water and the fish and the boats and the wind.

Our next home was in Minnetonka,Minnesota but there wasn't much Wind there except when the storms blew in with snow and cold and one tornado that blew a tree on our Neighbor's house. One particularly nasty snowstorm took out the electrical lines and we were without power for four days. We lived in Minnetonka, Minnesota for 16 years. Our two sweet daughters were born there. Our two sons brought their brides there to meet us before they were married. The boys also had their wedding receptions there in Minnetonka.

We made our next home in Portland,Oregon for the next 13 years. Portland has a gentle soft breeze and the wind and the rain fall like a gentle mist most of the time. Our two sweet daughters were married and went off to college from this home. By this time we were grandparents of six grandchildren. Bob retired from the Fei company and we were called on a mission to Hawaii where Bob taught astronomy and physical science and I was his assistant. I also got to teach watercolor and was the stake primary president. We served for two years there and lived in Turtle Bay resort. There is nothing so rejuvenating as the Polynesian ocean breezes. Often as the sun was setting Bob and I would walk to the ocean shore,sit under an ironwood tree and feel the gentle breeze blowing off the ocean.

We moved back to Portland for a short time and then to our home in Eagle Mountain, Utah, where today I am writing this memory of the wind that is so tied to my own memories of life and home and feelings.

Hear the Wind blow love--hear the wind blow -- down in the valley --off the ocean --up on the mountains we hear the wind blow.